ONE PNE fan’s Wembley dream ended with him escaping death by a whisker.

Lifelong fan Stephen Weyer, from Higher Walton, was on a minibus down to London when, just 30 miles away from the stadium, he suddenly doubled over in agony.

Instead of watching Jermaine Beckford light up the capital with a sublime hat-trick, the 50-year-old was on an operating table undergoing life-saving surgery after scar tissue became entangled around his bowel.

He said: “We were 30 miles away from Wembley at a service station. I’d felt rough all journey but then I was doubled over in agonising pain.

“I got back on the bus and everyone said ‘Steve the noises you are making aren’t normal, we are going to have to get an ambulance’.

“I thought I’d be right as rain in two hours so I told everyone to go to Wembley without me.

“But within 30 minutes of arriving at Luton Hospital I was on an operating table.

“If I hadn’t have gone to hospital I don’t think I’d be here – my stomach would have burst.”

The care worker is still stranded in Luton, 200 miles away from his fiancée Mandy Jones and too ill to eat or be transferred back to the Royal Preston Hospital.

He said: “Scar tissue from a hernia operation I had years ago had been growing around my bowel making it smaller and smaller.

“So a load of gasses and excess have been going into my stomach.

“Loads of green liquid is coming out of my stomach into a bag. I look like I’m nine months pregnant. I can’t walk.

“It would have burst, sending a load of poisons into my body.

“Mandy can’t make it down – she can’t get time off from work.

“It is absolutely frustrating, I’m 200 miles away from my whole family and I’ve not had anything to eat since Sunday and I still might need another operation.”

But the PNE fan says one of the worst things about his near-death experience is that he has not seen a second of the 4-0 win over Swindon.

And he called on North End striker Joe Garner to make his dream come true by sending him a DVD of the game.

He said: “One of the worst things is that I haven’t even seen a goal yet.

“But it is a good job I did come here and didn’t go to Wembley I could have been in a worse condition.

“If Joey Garner sent me some boots or a DVD of the game it would make my dreams come true.

“All I want to do is close the curtains and sit up with a cup of tea watching the game like I was there.”